First: Do No Harm
by L. Mouse
Summary: Ratchet meets Dr. House when alien nanytes are discovered in a critically injured Sam Witwicky's blood. The resulting critical mass of snark ends the universe as we know it.
1. Chapter 1

Author's notes:

This is totally and completely unrelated to _Masks. _Chapters on this story will also be slow to come; I'm just getting some ideas down right now, with the idea of writing this after _Masks _and possibly _The Imposter Impala from the Planet Cybertron _are done.

What happens when the universe's two snarkiest doctors meet?

* * *

"Aliens." Cuddy said flatly, and regarded Dr. House across the top of her desk with one eyebrow lifted. She'd heard a lot of theories from him, over the years, some more crackpot than others. The craziest of them were often _right_, but Dr. House was a also known and established practical joker. And he did it just to screw with her head. Really, she didn't know if this was Dr. House being an ass this time, or if he was really telling the truth.

If he was telling the truth this time, it was enough to make her want to hyperventilate, and she wasn't someone normally prone to panicking. If he was screwing with her, she was going to kill him. Slowly. With his own cane. Violence would be a completely appropriate response.

"Better call the CDC." Dr. House smirked, clearly picking up on her irritation and worry. "Looks like an alien plague to me."

"Alien ... plague."

"Well, _earth _germs don't look like this." He slapped a full-color printout down on her desk.

"Are you joking?" She looked down at the photograph, obviously taken from a microscope slide, then back up at him.

"Would I joke about something like this?" He gave her his best wounded-puppy look.

"Yes." Her frown turned into a scowl. "You said you found these ... germs ... in the man's blood stream?"

The picture showed boxy-looking organisms, about half again the size of the red blood cells they were surrounded by. They looked like nothing more than microscopically tiny mites, and _nothing _like a human cell. Or any germ, really.

"Aliens germs."

"Alien germs." She repeated his words, eyebrows raising.

"In his _blood_." Dr. House emphasized. He was loving this. His tone of voice indicated that he'd found an awesomely interesting puzzle, and was just having a grand old time.

Cuddy stood up, and decided she'd verify this herself before she called the CDC. "If you're screwing with me, House, I swear ..." she honestly, couldn't think of anything vile enough to threaten him with, so she simply headed for the isolation ward.

Fifteen minutes later, after viewing a smear of the critically ill man's blood under a microscope, she _did _call the CDC. Only later would she learn that when the CDC docs viewed the files she sent them, they immedately notified the president, who, in what she would later conclude was a stunning display of intelligence, the president made a personal call to the one medic on the entire planet who had real-world experience with alien medicine.

Forty-five minutes later, her cell phone rang with an unfamiliar phone number. She answered it, "Cuddy here."

"This is Dr. Ratchet. The President asked me to call you ..." a warm voice said. He had a faint, indefinable accent.

"The president?" she said, thinking of various trade associations, other hospitals, charitable organizations, and a whole host of other groups that had _presidents. _She was a bit distracted, admittedly, and the obvious answer to the question of president-of-what didn't occur to her immediately. The man, found comatose and battered in the middle of a road, with injuries that indicated some sort of very violent trauma, had started to seize and cough up blood. House was ecstatic. The rest of the staff, less so, particularly those few who knew what they might be dealing with -- which was her and House's gaggle of students.

She didn't have time to deal with this Dr. Ratchet. She was trying to track down everyone who might have had contact with the man, in case House was right and this was a _contagious _plague, in addition to being a potentially alien infection. "I'm a bit busy."

"The President of the United States." The man's clarification sounded impatient. "Among other things, I'm probably your world's foremost expert in xenomedicine."

"In who-what medicine?"

"Alien medicine."

"I didn't know we _had _an expert in alien medicine."

"You're not _supposed _to know," the man grumped. "Look, I'll be there in about a day. Keep the kid alive until I get there, will you? He's important."

Something about the man's tone made her say, "You know him?"

"Brilliant deduction. Your world's foremost resident in alien medicine _might _know the kid with the alien nanyte infection. Just don't kill him until I get there." He paused a beat. "And _don't _do an MRI. I understand he was in an accident. Cat scan. X-rays. Faith healing. Dancing around singing and shaking rattles at him. All fine. _Don't _do an MRI. Don't get him within a hundred _miles _of an MRI machine."

The man's medical files were on her desk. She flipped through them, then said, with a feeling of forboding, "What happens if he has an MRI?"

There was another pause.

"Well," the voice responded dryly, "the results might be better than if you fed him after midnight, arguably, but I hope your staff likes being immortal. Keep him in isolation, slaggit. And shut that MRI machine down until we can decontaminate it."

"Fed him after midnight ...? Immortal?"

"_Primus. _Nevermind. I trust your staff can provide basic life support. I'll fix the slagging damage you did when I get there. And by the way, any idea where the Camaro he was driving went?"

"Impound yard?" she guessed. "Back up. Nanytes. Did you just refer to _Gremlins_? And immortal what-how-huh?"

"If his car was in the impound yard I wouldn't be asking, yes nanytes, and yes immortal, if you manage not to kill him. If he wakes up ask him about the car and tell him I'm on my way. It's important. I'll be there tomorrow morning. I'm in California right now and your world's slagging impossibly _slow _when it comes to arranging transport. I swear I'd get their faster if I drove."

"... our world?" she said, picking those two relevant words out of the long vent.

Instead of a response to her, she heard a dial tone.

After a moment, she went in search of House. She found him in the the boy's room, where House was completely ignoring isolation protocol. He didn't even have a mask on. Through the speaker at the door she said, "The CDC's sending an expert."

"Really? Just want we need, a stuffed shirt to tell me how to do my job." House didn't sound at all impressed, or even very interested.

After the scathing and snarky tones Dr. Ratchet had delivered during his brief conversation with her, she was honestly looking forward to seeing them meet. "Really. His name's Dr. Ratchet and he says not to kill his patient until he gets here. Oh, and the things in his blood are called nanytes and they're probably ferromagnetic."

House wasn't the only one who could put two and two together and come up with five. Ratchet had been concerned about the MRI, and had been distressed when he'd found out they'd already scanned the boy. MRIs used a potent magnetic field that would play havoc on anything sensitive to magnetism within it.

"Already knew that." House opened the door and stuck his head out. She took a huge step back. "MRI was useless. Can't scan someone who's full of metal. We probably killed the poor bastard doing it, too."

He shut the door again in her face and returned to the bed, where she watched through the window as he poked the pale, bruised, swollen boy in the chest with the tip of his cane. Through the speaker she heard him ask the comatose young man, "So? What's your story, anyway? You gonna infect all of us with alien nanytes and turn us into zombies? 'Cuz, that'd be _cool_. Always wanted to treat a zombie."


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

* * *

It actually took Dr. Ratchet around fourteen hours to arrive, not the full day he'd implied. When Cuddy arrived at work the following morning, a lime green ambulance pulled into the parking garage in front of her. She didn't recognize the vehicle. It appeared to be a modified Hummer, but she'd never actually seen anyone retrofit a Hummer as an ambulance before.

The logo was unfamiliar, but claimed "Search and Rescue" as a function.

_Private company? _she wondered, heading for staff parking. Much to her displeasure, there was a familiar motorcycle parked in _her _designated spot, and no other openings in the employee area. With a grumble, she looped around and found a spot in public parking, which turned out to be half a dozen spaces down from the ambulance.

The driver was just opening the door when she stepped out. Somewhat to her surprise, he appeared to be military, which made the civilian appearance of the ambulance even _more _odd. He was a tall man, a couple inches over six feet, and appeared to be a sexy, fit forty years of age or so. The driver had a buzzed haircut, a neatly trimmed mustache, just the right amount of muscles, keen blue eyes, and the assertive posture of someone who'd spent long years in a military setting.

He was also wearing distinctly military garb: a pair of camo pants with multiple pockets, a khaki undershirt, and a camo long-sleeve shirt with more pockets. The latter was buttoned all the way up, so all she could see of the undershirt was the collar. Combat boots, a fanny pack with multiple tools in it, and several electronic devices clipped to his belt clinched the image. _Definitely _military, though there was no recognizable insignia to tell her what branch. The only emblems she could spot was a face-like design on one sleeve, and a caduceus on the other.

They headed for the same elevator, and she shot him several curious looks. That scrutiny was rewarded when she noticed a name embroidered in dark thread on one pocket: Ratchet. She could have sworn it had not been there a second before.

"Oh! You're Dr. Ratchet!"

"Dr. Cuddy?" His voice sounded even better in person than over the phone.

She pulled her badge out of her pocket and clipped it to the pocket of her blouse. "That's me. Interesting ride you've got out there."

His lips twitched. "It's actually a military vehicle."

"What, you didn't rank a ride without lime green paint?"

"I _like _the paint." He sounded unaccountably annoyed. He huffed a sigh, then added, "And the vehicle has a complete miniaturized diagnostic lab and operating theater in the back. It goes where I go, and there's far more equipment in the vehicle than the volume of space it occupies would suggest."

Her eyes must have widened.

He chuckled, though it sounded like a tired laugh. "We decided to make it appear to be a civilian vehicle. The appearance of a civilian ambulance at the site of a disaster is greeted with relief, whereas a military vehicle might cause a panic."

"What branch are you?" She looked, again, in vain for an insignia. At least his explanation made sense, though the implications were a bit disturbing. Had other hospital administrators in other cities had similar cases involving this Dr. Ratchet?

"I'm currently working with a U.S. Army special forces team." He hesitated, then added, "The details are fairly sensitive, I'm sorry. I can't answer a lot of questions, though I'm certain your contacts at the CDC will verify I'm qualified to treat Mr. Witwicky's issues."

She'd already spoken to them, to verify his story that he was being sent to assist them by Presidential request. That _didn't _mean he was qualified. It did mean she would be diplomatic, particularly since she wasn't sure anyone was qualified to deal with an alien infection. House, on the other hand, was probably going to be an ass on general principles.

_Ohmygod alien infection alien life forms aliens ... _she had not actually slept much last night. They had a patient with a bonafide alien infection, if their assumptions were correct. This was the stuff of nightmares.

"How's Sam's condition?" Ratchet asked, with what sounded like more than academic interest.

"He's in a medically induced coma, but his vitals are stable. His intracranial pressure lowered some overnight." She'd spoken to the ICU head nurse herself, first thing in the morning. The elevator bumped to a stop at their floor, and she led the way out. "Where'd you go to school?"

Ratchet ignored the question about his school. "You have him sedated?"

"That is standard for the level of head and spinal trauma he experienced." She glanced at him, hearing the disapproving tone. Thought she suspected she knew the answer, she asked, "Do you know him personally?"

"He's a friend." Ratchet's response was curt.

"So, do you know what happened?"

"Not exactly." Ratchet's tone turned dour. "I'd assume he and his ... car ... ran into enemies."

"Enemies that left him with a, what did you call it, nanyte infection?" _Car? What about the car?_

"I'll be happy to discuss his condition and treatment with you and your staff, after I have a chance to examine him." Ratchet lifted his eyebrows at her, then courteously reached ahead to open a door. "I'd prefer a more less public setting when I do so. Sam has a right to his privacy."

They were in the middle of a hall. Cuddy flushed, feeling unaccountably embarrassed, even though she'd walked down this very hall a thousand times while discussing a case with her peers. It was, probably, a bad habit. It was also something nearly every doctor she knew did.

Then she realized that Ratchet had been perfectly happy to discuss the patient right up until she started asking _him _questions, and she started to point this out. Ratchet, smoothly, added, "More to the point, the general public would be better off not knowing Sam's private details."

_Oh_.

Right.

Let's-not-panic-the-mundanes. Aliens. Alien _infections_.

She stopped briefly at the security desk, snagged a visitor badge for him, then, without further comment, led the way to nurse's station at the entrance to the ICU. She grabbed Sam's file, thrust it into Ratchet's hands, and then lead the way to his room.

"He doesn't need full isolation," Ratchet said, walking into Sam's room without bothering with protective garb. "But it's probably a good idea to keep him in a private room."

After a moment's consideration, Cuddy followed Ratchet through the door. Ratchet was the expert, and Ratchet wasn't worried.

Ratchet set the file down on a table without reading it, walked over to the bed, and rested a hand on Sam's bruised forehead like a mother checking a child's temperature. The man in the bed was young, and very battered, and slight and short as well, and looked lost amid a tangle of tubes, IVs, and equipment. He was on a ventilator, with a tube down his throat, and due to his broken neck his skull was bolted to a metal cage and the cage attached to his shoulders. The whole setup looked like medieval torture, but he was unconscious.

Ratchet's touch was startlingly gentle as he wiped a smudge of blood off Sam's bruised cheek with his thumb. She was used to doctors who were a little more callous, and less personal. Well, Sam was a friend. He sighed and said softly, "Sam, you get in the worst scrapes, sometimes ..."

She asked, "He's been hurt before?"

"He's been dead before." Ratchet gave her a sideways look, lips tilting upwards into something that might have been a smile, had it been a happier expression. His joking -- at least, she hoped he was joking -- words seemed at odd with his expression. Perhaps it was a private punch line to a joke she couldn't fathom. Then Ratchet unclipped something that resembled, of all things, a Star Trek tricorder, and aimed it at the boy.

Cuddy peered over Ratchet's shoulder. The device had a display screen that now showed a startlingly good imagine of Sam's head and neck. It was like an instant hand-held cat scan, and her eyebrows dang near met her hairline, she lifted them so high. "That's an interesting gadget you've got there."

"It's a scanner."

She managed not to respond with a House-like, _Well, obviously. _"Aliens, hmm?" was what she did say, and she was quite proud of the fact that she managed to sound only mildly surprised by the device.

"Hmmm." He waved the scanner over Sam's head, then showed her the image. "He had a subdural bleed."

Which she knew. It was in his medical records. They'd operated even before House had gotten involved. The nanytes in the boy's blood had been discovered _after _the surgery.

"Which was inadequately repaired," the man added testily, peering closely at the scanner himself. She thought they'd done a good job of stopping the bleeding, actually, and there was a better-than-even chance that the kid would have a decent neurological outcome, as opposed to being a vegetable. At least, his head would probably be okay. His neck had been broken by the same blow that had given him a bleed on the surface of his brain. He wasn't ever going to walk again. The x-rays in his files had shown devastating damage, and the surgery last night to stabilize his spine had confirmed the worst.

"And, of course, your fragging prehistoric scanning machine scrambled the programming in the repair nanytes in his blood _and _nearly killed him by disrupting his circulatory system and causing significant diffuse organ damage." He gave her a look that was positively accusing.

She held her hands up defensively. "Woah. We had no idea he had an alien infection."

"It's not an infection." He sounded grumpy. "They are -- were -- medical nanytes. Sam's carried them in his blood for years. Now I have to reprogram them before the damage to his nervous system is irreparable. _Primus_."

He poked at the scanner's touch-sensitive screen several times with the eraser end of a pencil, causing it to display illegible alien-looking glyphs on its screen. He muttered, "Kid would have been fine ... _Primus _... better if he'd just laid in a ditch somewhere until he woke up ..."

She was quite experienced at ignoring semi-irrational ranting from cranky men. Instead of addressing his vent, she asked the question that had been bugging her, "So, uh, aliens. You're clearly human. Have you, uh, met them?"

Blue eyes glanced in her direction briefly. "I've met aliens. Some of them look human enough that you couldn't tell without one of these." He jerked his scanner up a bit, indicating it.

"Star Trek aliens, hmm."

"Aliens with very good disguises." He sounded somewhat distracted. "We made scanners like this," he poked it again, "for the special forces teams," poke, "to look for," poke, "aliens in disguise," poke, poke, poke, _poke_, "but it works well enough for medical purposes too, when I can't use the equipment in my," poke, poke, _jab_, scowl, _poke! _"vehicle mode."

"Vehicle mode?"

"The ambulance. Never mind that." He flipped a metal lid over the scanner's display screen and held it in one hand one and dug into one of the pockets of his shirt with his free fingers. She wondered if she could convince him to let her borrow the device. Did he have _any _idea what that thing would be worth to a doctor? Probably. He was a doctor, and he'd just referred to the hospital's MRI machine as a 'primitive' device.

"Can I see your scanner?" she asked, mad curiosity overwhelming her.

"No." He clipped it back on his belt, and didn't offer an apology for his refusal. Instead, he produced a large syringe, a glass 100ml vial nearly full of silvery liquid, and something that looked vaguely like a taser from various pockets. He clipped the vial between the taser-thing's two prongs, and proceeded to jab and mutter at the gadget for a couple of seconds before pushing and holding a button. The silvery liquid in the vial swirled wildly in reaction to whatever he was doing before settling into the distinctive arcs and swirls that indicated it was reacting to a strong magnetic field.

"Those are nanytes?"

He frowned at her. "Smart woman. Yes."

He started to pull the nanytes up into a syringe.

"You know that I can't allow you to use an unproven medical treatment on a patient in my ..."

The look he gave her made feel profoundly stupid, and she shut up. In a tone that one might use on a particularly stupid child, he said, "It's proven, established, and accepted medicine. Just not on Earth."

"Aliens."

The smirk was back.

"You called him immortal."

"Well, he _was_, short of something like beheading. Between the blood loss during surgery and the damage done by the MRI, a good portion of his nanytes have been dispersed throughout the building, and the ones in _his _body aren't going to be nearly as good at repairing trauma damage since their specialized programming's been erased. Their default hardcode is for a different species than humans. They'll work, just not nearly as swift and efficiently. And without coding them to his specific DNA, they're going to start to work on _anyone_."

"Will they hurt anyone?"

"No," he growled, "but without they're self-replicating and can be spread by intimate contact."

"So they are infectious."

"Technically speaking. Don't worry. We'll decontaminate your equipment for you."

"And anyone who's infected?"

"Procedure is to render them non-contagious and non-replicating." He lifted an eyebrow at her and held up the syringe. "Which takes additional nanytes to interface with the deprogrammed nanytes in the blood stream. They _can _be completely deactivated and removed from the body using a modified dialysis machine. However, most people do not wish them to be removed when they learn they are infected."

"Really?"

"What part of _immortal _is not obvious?"

She considered that. "And they don't do any harm?"

"Harm? Depends on what you think of never getting cancer, healing swiftly from anything short of catastrophic injuries, and avoiding illness for the rest of your very, very, _very _long life." He tapped the syringe to get an air bubble out.

"Hnh. So I take it you're not _that _worried about it spreading." There had to be a catch.

Surprisingly fierce blue eyes fixed her with a sharp gaze. "When not tuned to a specific DNA pattern, they're infectious if they're aerosolized -- as in a medical procedure -- or via intimate contact."

"So your lovers end up living forever too," she mused.

The man snorted a laugh. "Which could be a problem in and of itself for some people, I suppose, but this world is _not _ready for vastly extended lifespans."

"People would not complain, much." She supposed certain religious wingnuts would object, but the same religious wingnuts would be in the streets screaming themselves hoarse if they knew there were real life aliens on Earth somewhere. It still didn't seem real to her, though she'd seen the evidence under a the microscope, and in the equipment the army doctor had brought with him.

An eyebrow lifted. "Immortality does not necessarily come with automatic birth control."

"Oh." She thought about that a bit. Did some math in her head. _Oh. _

"Indeed."

Now she wondered what made Sam Witwicky so special that he got immortality nanytes, and the rest of the world wasn't supposed to have them? Though, to be fair, the implication that they could heal someone swiftly from serious injuries could be an advantage to a soldier. Dr. Ratchet had stated he worked with Army Special Forces.

_Just what have we stumbled on to, here?_

She was frankly surprised he was saying _anything_. Given the magnitude of the issues, why hadn't the government just swept in a la E.T., cordoned off the whole hospital, made the young man in the bed disappear, and held everyone who'd so much as _looked _at him in quarantine until they were rendered non-infectious?

While she tried to puzzle this out, Ratchet finished drawing 10 CC's of nanytes up into a syringe, and then lifted the man's limp hand up. Again she saw him be so very gentle. It was at odds with his verbal snark.

Slowly, expertly, and with infinite care, he injected the nanytes into one of the man's IV's. She should have stopped him. She should have protested harder. She didn't have a clue what he was doing, hadn't even _seen _his credentials, and he hadn't even really explained who or what he was.

He briefly rested two fingers against the man's right wrist, then squeezed the man's fingers in a gesture of comfort before releasing his hand. She stood by while he injected the contents of the entire large vial into the man's circulatory system, using multiple different IV's. They were pumping a lot of drugs into him, and taking blood regularly, so he had a cannula in each arm, and one in the back of his right hand.

"How long until you see results?" she asked.

Dr. Ratchet reached up and turned down the sedative drip to a level that would allow the man to regain consciousness, though he'd be somewhat groggy. Then he took the scanner back off his belt, poked at it a couple of times, and handed it to her. "See for yourself."

The device had a sturdy feel to it. Its case was metal, not plastic, and it was heavier than it looked. She stared over it at him, shocked that he'd just handed it to her when a minute ago he'd said no. _He's just a smart ass, _she decided, and, in truth, she liked that in a man. She was far more amused than annoyed.

The language the scanner was displaying was not English and probably not anything human. It looked like Egyptian hieroglyphics, more than anything else. Ratchet showed her the buttons to push to flip through the images he'd taken, which he'd overlaid with the man's x-rays from yesterday. Ratchet's scans were absolutely crystal clear and looking like they'd come from the best CT scanner on the market. She could toggle from yesterday's x-rays to Ratchet's scans and compare them.

The images of his spine made her eyebrows rise. It seemed to show radical healing of the fractured vertebrae, beyond anything plausible at this very early stage. "This is real?"

Ratchet's fingers brushed hers as he tapped the screen, making it show her more images. "Yes. It's real."

"Should you even be showing me this?" His fingers had felt cool, and weirdly fuzzy, like the static buzz from a television monitor. "Is this, uh, classified?"

"No." He sat down on the foot of the bed, reached for Sam's chart, and started making notes in it. "It's not classified. The government would _like _to make it classified, but the aliens aren't always interested in cooperating. The compromise that has been reached is a certain degree of discretion on the part of the aliens, in exchange for the government not restricting their activities excessively.."

Sam's feet were next to Ratchet's hip, under a blanket. One twitched, bumping the doctor. He glanced down, and then tugged the blanket back andd ran a neatly trimmed fingernail along the sole of the boy's foot with some force. Though still unconscious, Sam jerked his foot away from a reflex reaction.

Ratchet smirked. "Now do you believe I'm a real doctor?"

"Ah ... I never said you weren't." She handed him his scanner back. Sam was supposed to be paralyzed, irreversibly. Evidence of such rapid, impossible, healing distracted her completely from his comments about aliens.

_Oh, God, the lives we could change ... the nanytes must have done something ... but already?_

Ratchet tested his reflexes by tickling his other foot, then patted the man's calf with what looked like an apologetic gesture, because the man groaned uncomfortably. "He'll come out of sedation pretty quickly. The nanytes I injected will stimulate his liver to clear chemicals more rapidly."

"Aliens, hmm?" She said, knowing she was repeating herself. "What do they look like? Where are they from?"

"They're refugees, the last, scant few survivors of an intergalactic war." He sounded rather sad. "Their homeworld is destroyed, the source of the conflict gone. They're just looking for a place to call home, now. Nothing more."

"Few?"

"Dozens, on Earth, at most." One shoulder lifted up in a shrug. "They were summoned here by a leader, but we're still accounting for everyone. As far as what they look like -- you've seen one, probably. Do you remember the hackers who created a hoax by hijacking network television feeds last year? There was a creature who wanted a boy."

"Uh, yeah." She'd found the hoax irritating.

Ratchet reached for the scanner she was holding, and reluctantly, she handed it back. He poked it with his pencil, making it chirp aloud a few times, then turned it around to show a picture on the screen. Apparently, it could also store candid photographs. An older teenager sat on the hood of a new Camaro, slouched with casual ease, looking like he was laughing.

"This is Sam?" she looked at the man in the bed.

"The picture's about two years old. He's nineteen, now."

With his face bruised, battered, swollen, nose broken, a tube coming out of his mouth, and eyes taped shut, he wasn't really recognizable and she'd somehow assumed him to be older. She hadn't actually noticed he was so young that his date of birth was the same year she'd entered medical school. The only thing really relevant, at this point, from a medical standpoint was that he was neither terribly old nor a pediatric patient.

"Nineteen," she repeated, though, because that was a _child _in her mind, even if medically speaking they'd treat him as an adult trauma patient.

"Here's a more recent picture." Ratchet manipulated the device to show another picture. Sam, now more of a man and less of a boy, with a stronger jaw and more sculpted features, was leaning against another yellow Camaro, this one a 2012 model -- she didn't even know those were on the market yet! -- with his arms folded. He was wearing a brown leather bomber jacket, sunglasses, and combat boots almost identical to Ratchet's, but she could see the castle-like turrets of one of Princeton's main buildings in the background.

"College student?" she guessed. Probably a rich family, to have two brand new Camaros, one after the other, and to be attending Princeton

"Mmm. He's a funny kid. He doesn't have to go to school, he's got a job for life as liason to the aliens, but he's insisting. He's really pushing himself, too. He's done about two years of work in three semesters -- one year. He didn't take summer off." Ratchet sounded proud.

"Expensive car."

"You don't know the half of it." Ratchet shook his head, and his next words showed her assumptions were wrong. "Don't misunderstand me. His family's solidly middle class. He's far from wealthy. The car's on loan to him."

Family. That reminded her. "Do we need to call his parents?"

"I've already talked to them." Ratchet lifted a shoulder in half a shrug. "Until we know what exactly happened to him, I'd rather they stay out of the line of fire. His enemies -- and he has some pretty major enemies -- have gone after them to get to him before."

"So, what's he involved with, organized crime?" She just couldn't seem to wrap her mind around the idea of _aliens. _She kept trying to find logical explanations, and she knew the question was stupid as soon as she asked it.

"Aliens." Ratchet tapped the picture and causing it to magnify Sam's face. "Remember the kid that the aliens wanted?"

"Aliens?" she said, feeling a bit like a scratched record.

"Aliens. That was a _real _alien you saw on the TV last year and that," he pointed at Sam, "is the kid they wanted."

"Uh." Good god, he was right. It was impossible to tell by looking at the boy in the bed, but the pictures _did _match up to the boy she remembered from the TV. "Why?"

"Sam's got a head full of information they'd like to have." Dr. Ratchet frowned suddenly, and bent over to pick up Sam's left hand. He spread Sam's fingers out on his own callused palm, and Cuddy saw that two were broken. Touching them also made Sam flinch a bit. So much for him being permanently paralyzed. The response to the pain made her grin, not because she was sadistic (that would be House) but because there was _hope _for this shattered ruin of a young man. Perhaos he would not be quadriplegic. She couldn't _wait _to hear House's reaction, either.

"These need to be splinted immediately, or they'll heal crooked. The nanyte repairs are quite swift." He frowned. "Do you have some finger splints and tape?"

"I'll have one of the nurses bring them." She regarded the man thoughtfully. "Why are you telling me all this?"

Dr. Ratchet smiled faintly. "Partly, because the kid does have enemies. It's entirely possible they may come after him again. I'd like you to warn your security staff, and keep him in an single room like this one."

"Given what's in his blood, _that's _not a problem."

Ratchet chuckled. "Any threat to Sam is likely to come in the form of a hired human, for what it's worth. We can detect the aliens approaching from a good long distance away, and the hospital's under some heavy-duty covert surveillance."

"Is it really, now?"

"Oh, yes." Ratchet scanned Sam's hand, and frowned. "I am surprised your staff missed this."

There was more than a little censor in Ratchet's voice. Cuddy forbore mentioning that broken fingers would have been low on the list of priorities, well below maintaining an airway, stopping that subdural bleed, monitoring intracranial pressure, and a half a dozen other critical issues. No brain, no body. And with a neck broken as badly as his had been, fixing crunched fingers just wasn't that important. It wasn't like they ever expected him to _use _his hands again.

Ratchet was aiming his scanner at Sam's chest and making _hmm_ing noises when House arrived. House pushed the glass door leading into the ICU room open with an aggressive thrust, limped in, and demanded, "And who are you and what are you doing to _my _patient?"

Cuddy smirked. "House, Dr. Ratchet. Ratchet, Dr. House."

"Ratchet." House regarded the man with a skeptical look. "Great. A jarhead medic. That's _always _a great sign of competence."

"Actually, he's Army."

"I'm technically an Army contractor." Ratchet lifted an eyebrow at House. "You're judging me by my garb, and I return the favor."

Cuddy covered her mouth to hide a grin. House was dressed in his usual jeans, wrinkled t-shirt, and too-small vest. On this day, jeans were two inches too short, baring slumping socks that didn't match. His sneakers were worn, elderly, and squishy wet -- it had rained earlier, and he'd ridden his motorcycle to work, as evidenced by said motorcycle in _her _parking space. Ratchet might be wearing BDUs, but he still had the upper hand when it came to style.

House leaned on his cane. "Out."

Ratchet turned back to Sam. "No."

House turned to Cuddy as if to protest this invasion in _his _domain. A physician was treating _his _patient, he didn't approve, and the man had just very calmly refused to cow to House's temper. Thoroughly entertained, she shrugged and said nothing.

Ratchet added, to House, "I understand that you're the Chief of Diagnostic Medicine at this hospital. Why was your patient unattended when I arrived?"

"There are nurses," Cuddy said, surprised by the question, even as House _stared_.

"Who have clearly not cared for him as they should." For a minute, Cuddy thought that Ratchet was talking about the broken fingers, but Ratchet said, "He's in clearly critical condition, and someone should have been _watching _him, directly supervising him, not trusting unreliable and primitive machines to do it."

"That's what nurses are _for_," House protested.

"Ratchet, the nursing staff cannot be in here every second." Cuddy was surprised at Ratchet's apparent expectation that a live person should have monitored Sam continuously. They just didn't have the staff.

Ratchet grumped, "If it were _my _patient who was this badly injured, and the monitors on him were as unreliable as the equipment you are using is, I'd be spending the night beside his bed."

Cuddy's eyebrows rose as she heard the truth in his words. This was a man who _would _go to those lengths, probably had, and expected it of others. She wondered if he had a family. She suspected he was a complete ass to work for, if he expected that level of devotion from other medical staff. And his patients probably loved him, too.

House growled, "And if I did it for one, they'd all expect it." He took two steps towards Ratchet. "But that's not what's got you upset, is it? You're some two-bit military doctor who couldn't scrape by with a _real _practice."

She thought House was just trying to find Ratchet's buttons.

Ratchet said, "I have had far fewer accusations of malpractice, malfeasance, and drug abuse than you have had -- and I've been practicing medicine quite a bit longer. Your legal record is as impressive as your diagnostic abilities. And I am not impressed by your legal record."

_Ouch_. Cuddy watched, fascinated, as House blinked at Ratchet. His response, however, was not the explosion she'd expected. "I'm _older _than you," House simply said.

Cuddy realized, _He said the nanytes extend human lifespans. He could be much older than he looks._

Ratchet laughed. "I'm well preserved. I graduated from medical school before you, trust me." However, behind the laughter, there was a spark of bright anger lurking. Cuddy could see it in his eyes, and she was certain House saw it too -- and would take advantage of it. "You would kick me off your precious case without even finding out what I know? That's not the mark of a renowned diagnostician."

"You don't know anything," House said, dismissively. Baitingly. "You're some government goon. I can't find a record of your name anywhere -- the AMA's never heard of you, and there's no Robert Ratchet, MD, _anywhere._ I even checked the likely foreign medical associations. You're not Canadian, you're not British -- though I could've told you _that _by the accent --"

Ratchet said something in what sounded like Japanese. Then he switched to Sonoran-accented Spanish and changed to Castillan in mid sentence, telling House that he was fluent in well over two dozen languages. He continued in German. With a smirk, he leaned against the bed and added a comment in Italian and then finished in British-accented English, "Surely, you would not use my accent or physical appearance to determine place of origin, Dr. House."

"Show-off." House sounded resentful. Cuddy was amused. House spoke multiple languages, fluently, but she thought he'd just been soundly trumped.

"As far as my identity, Robert Ratchet is not in the AMA's database, no." Ratchet's eyes were dancing in amusement, the anger gone, which was serving to piss House off. Cuddy was pretty sure that this was every bit as deliberate as House's attempts. Ratchet added, in a calm tone that _had _to be chosen just to tick House off further, "Robert Ratchet is, of course, a pseudonym."

_Of course, _Cuddy thought. _Of course it is._

He nodded to Cuddy. "What biographical details I've given you about myself are accurate. You might find the omissions to be as illuminating, however, as the details."

Cuddy recognized a teasing challenge when she heard it. She'd just been given permission -- like she needed it -- to try to figure Ratchet out. House heard it too, and his eyes both narrowed and lit with intense curiosity. To House, she said, "The CDC vouches for him. And I've been talking to him and watching him work for twenty minutes. He knows what he's doing. And he's got some gadgets you might find interesting."

In the bed, Sam made a gagging noise, and lifted a hand towards the tubing in his mouth. Ratchet, smoothly, caught his wrist. "Easy, Sam. I'm here."

"He moved." House sounded surprised, something that was difficult to do.

Ratchet snapped, "Yes, he did. Since you managed not to kill him, he's healing at a very accelerated rate."

"Well, that's just _cool_. Is it the nanytes?"

"Yes."

"That's all _sorts _of science-fictionish neat." House had gone from pissed to fascinated in one heartbeat. He reached out and pinched Sam's toe, hard. Sam yanked his foot away and then writhed in obvious pain. House said, positively ecstatic with curiosity and delight, "He could feel that!"

Ratchet shot House a glare. Then he slid his fingers through Sam's and held his hand. "Shh, easy Sam. I'm here. You're in the hospital ... if you can understand me, I want you to squeeze my hand."

Sam's eyes fluttered, and Cuddy saw his fingers move. He heard Ratchet. He was responding.

House poked Sam in the foot again, hard, with evident curiosity. Sam yanked his foot away and winced again. "He moves!"

"Pardon me, Sam," Ratchet patted him very gently on the shoulder. Then, with incredibly good reflexes, he snatched House's cane away and shoved him in the chest hard with the flat of one hand. House clattered to the ground in a tangle of legs and arms. Ratchet tossed the cane so it landed on top of him. Then he turned his back on House.

Cuddy stared, awed, shocked, and not in any particular mood to object. The violence had been swift, efficient, and completely on House's level.

House stared too, mouth hanging open, from his position sprawled on the floor. "You _assaulted _me. You hit a cripple!"

Ratchet snapped back without turning around, "You want respect from me, you treat my friend and _my _patient with respect."

"Cuddy, he hit me!"

Cuddy shrugged. House had done far, far worse over the years. Frankly, she was surprised more people didn't hit him. There had been times when she'd been tempted to deck him. And he wasn't _that _much of a cripple.

"Cuddy!" House sounded almost whiney.

Cuddy held her hands up in surrender. "Okay, okay. Dr. Ratchet, please don't hit House. He's annoying when his feelings are hurt, and he tends to get revenge."

"I'll bet." Ratchet didn't look at House. He was peering into Sam's eyes with a flashlight, checking his reflexes. He returned to the gentle tone he'd been using earlier, "Sam, you have a ventilator tube in your throat. You will not be able to speak. You are in a hospital in New Jersey. You've been unconscious for twenty-four hours."

Sam twitched, and tried to grab for the ventilator tube.

Ratchet caught his hand again. "Sam, do you know who I am? Squeeze my fingers if you do."

He did. He seemed agitated, though, because he tried to reach for the tube with his other hand, and he writhed.

"Are you in pain?" Ratchet asked.

"No _duh _he's in pain," House sniped.

Ratchet clarified, "Are you in extreme pain? One squeeze for yes, two for no."

He squeezed once.

Ratchet asked, "Your head?"

That got him three squeezes.

"Yes and no ..." Ratchet mused. "Does more than your head hurt?"

Cuddy watched, and House fumed silently and on general principles, as Ratchet determined that Sam's head hurt the worst, but he was also complaining of significant pain in his neck (unsurprisingly) and stomach. When Ratchet pulled the scanner back out and scanned the man's stomach a second time, Cuddy was _deeply _amused to see House's reaction.

House grabbed the scanner from Ratchet's hands as soon as Ratchet was done, and turned it on his own thigh. "This thing's fake," he growled, poking the same buttons and symbols, in the same order, as Ratchet had.

A perfect scan of House's ravaged thigh popped up on the machine's display.

Ratchet peered over House's arm. The proximity made they were close to the same height. Ratchet's broad shoulders and solid build made him look bigger all around. "I could fix that, you know."

House stared at him.

Ratchet pointed at a small symbol blinking in one corner of the display. "You're contaminated."

"Contaminated?"

"With the nanytes." Ratchet tried to take his scanner back, and House held it out of Ratchet's reach, extending his arm over his head. House's arms appeared to be an inch or two longer. House had long limbs and not a spare ounce of flesh anywhere. Ratchet was built big, but not _gangly._

Cuddy held her breath, expecting Ratchet to knock House down again. The man's eyes were not friendly; Ratchet looked pissed off, despite his observation that -- using whatever advanced tech that Ratchet had access to -- that House's leg was repairable. Quite possibly, Ratchet had said that to annoy House. Ratchet was figuring out House's buttons much faster than House was getting Ratchet's.

Ratchet didn't quite disappoint, either, though this time he restrained himself from dumping House on his ass. He simply stepped on House's foot. House dropped his arm reflexively, and Ratchet snagged the scanner out of his hand. "As I was saying, you have picked up plenty of nanytes. They can be reprogrammed to repair your leg. I'd be willing to do it." A positively evil smile touched the Ratchet's lips. "Though there's nothing medical I can do about your personality."

Cuddy snickered. She couldn't help it. House looked like he wasn't just sucking on a lemon, but was about to choke on it. Ratchet was giving as good as he was getting from House, and had made far more scoring points on House's psyche.

Ratchet fiddled with his scanner for a second, aiming it at Sam. Sam's eyes were half open, more-or-less coherent, and fixed on Ratchet. Ratchet said, "Sam, can you give me a thumb's up?"

Slowly, shakily, with his uninjured right hand, Sam did.

Ratchet sat back down on the bed. "Thumb's up for yes, thumb's down for no. I'll try to make this fast and then we'll put you back under. You have a spinal headache, and the pain in your abdomen is from diffuse micro cellular damage to your internal organs from the dislocation of the nanytes when they attempted to put you through an MRI scan. I'm going to tattoo 'no MRI's' on your back for the future, I swear."

Sam gave him a shaky thumb's up at that idea.

Ratchet's smirk of amusement looked a lot friendlier than any expression he'd given House. "Don't worry, I think most of the damage is not permanent. Can you see me clearly?"

A thumb's down. _No_.

"Does he wear glasses?" Cuddy asked.

"No, it's from the head injury." Ratchet glanced at her. "Sam, that will correct itself as you heal. Here we go: Do you know where Bumblebee is?"

_No_.

"Was he with you when you were attacked?"

_Yes._

"Do you know if he was injured?"

_Yes._

"Was he conscious the last time you saw him?"

_Yes._

"Did he leave you behind to draw off your attackers?"

_No._

"Was he fighting them off the last time you saw him?"

_Yes._

"'Cons?"

_Yes._

"Did you recognize them?"

_Yes. No._

"Does that mean some you recognized, and some you didn't?"

_Yes._

"Did Bee mention the names of any of the new ones?"

_Yes._

"How many total?"

The man held up four fingers.

"How many did you recognize?"

_Two_.

"Okay, I'm going to start naming names. When I hit a name of a 'con you saw, you give me a thumb's down."

Sam gave him a thumb's up in response to this idea. Ratchet smirked. "Well, I wouldn't ask you to give me a thumb's up because you saw a 'con ... Megatron ... Starscream ... Barricade ..."

Barricade got a thumb's down.

"... Skywarp ..."

Another thumb's down. Cuddy assumed these were code names.

"_Slaggit._ Just what we need. I bet you two had a _pit _of a time in that fight ... did Bee at least get a couple good hits in?"

_Yes_.

"Good for him, the little fragger. Okay, Sam, you're doing good. I know everything hurts. Some more names, and I'm totally guessing here, but let's see how accurate I can be. Shockwave? ... Soundwave?"

Soundwave got a thumb's down.

"Hnnh. Figured he was going to slither his way out of orbit eventually." Ratchet made a face. "Do you know if the fourth 'con was one of Soundwave's symbiote's?"

_Yes. No._

"Yes you knew, no he wasn't?"

_Yes._

"Slag, that would be too easy, of course."

Cuddy was listening to this in absolute fascination. "These are aliens you're talking about?"

"Yes," Ratchet answered, distractedly. "And Soundwave's trouble. If he's got Bee ..."

The boy's heart rate spiked, and the ventilator beeped an alarm as he struggled to breath on his own.

"Easy, kid. You know Prime will tear the 'cons apart until we get him back. I doubt he's dead -- he's too valuable to them alive." Ratchet patted Sam's forearm very gently. "Was the fourth a flier?"

_No._

"Barricade's size?"

_No._

"Bigger?"

_No._

"Smaller, then. That narrows it down a bit. Bigger than Wheelie?"

_Yes, yes, yes._

"Just a little smaller than Barricade?"

_Yes._

"Civilian alt mode?"

_Yes._

"Slag. They're getting smarter. So a smaller 'con than Barricade, but only a little bit. Did he have a pulse cannon?"

Sam held up two fingers.

"Two pulse cannons?"

_Yes._

"Was he blue?"

_No._

"Red?"

_Yes._

Ratchet snorted. "Crazy little psychotic fragger named Wildrider?"

_Yes, yes, yes. _Sam formed his hand into a gun and shakily mimed shooting something.

"I hope that means Bee nailed him a good one," Ratchet snorted.

_Yes, yes, yes._

"Did they attack you at school first?"

_No._

"Ambushed you when you were out driving?"

_Yes._

"Did Bee say he couldn't call for help?"

_Yes._

"Soundwave was probably jamming his transmissions. They found you at ..." Ratchet gave cross streets, "... was that close to where you were attacked?"

_Yes._

"One more question -- were they after you or Bee? Do you know?"

Sam pointed at himself.

"Damn. And we don't even know _why _this time." Ratchet stroked Sam's bruised cheek with his thumb. "Don't worry, kid. We'll take it from here. You've done good."

House, who had been standing next to the IV stand, turned the sedation back on. "Night night, kid."

Ratchet shot him a look of irritation, but didn't say anything in protest. He simply held Sam's hand as the boy's eyes fluttered and he slowly drifted off. House poked Sam with the tip of his cane after a couple of minutes, hard. "Well. He's asleep."

"Do that again," Ratchet warned House, "and I will break that cane in two over my knee."

House, smirking, snagged the scanner back out of Ratchet's unsuspecting grasp. He danced backwards, moving with agility that didn't particularly surprise Cuddy. Ratchet didn't pursue him, but simply sat down in a chair beside the bed. "Since you do not have the staff to watch Sam until he's no longer critical, I will do so."

"Ooh, Cuddy, it can see through your clothes." House had the scanner aimed at Cuddy. "I can see your uterus!"

"You're an ass," she said, trying to take the scanner back. House stepped out of her reach. "House, I swear ..."

Eyes alight with mischief, House turned the scanner on Ratchet ... and stopped short. The scanner had just crashed. It was showing, amusingly to Cuddy, a Blue Screen of Death.

Ratchet quirked an eyebrow up. "If you've broken my scanner, I might mention that it's worth close to seven figures."

"Really?" House slapped it hard, then "accidentally" dropped it. As the device hit the ground with a clatter, he looked up and gave Ratchet a faux-guilty look. Cuddy winced as House purred, "Oh, whoopsie!"

It bounced across the floor and stopped at Ratchet's feet. He bent over, picked it up, and quietly clipped it on his belt. Then he rose from the chair and told Cuddy in a cold voice, "I'll be back in a moment. If your employee is going to abuse my equipment, I'll leave it in my vehicle where it will be safe from vandalism."

Cuddy felt a sudden, unaccountable, flare of embarrassment. Ratchet's earlier warmth and humor was completely gone. Did he blame _her _for House's behavior? She was House's supervisor, sure, but she was also reasonably sure there wasn't a force on Earth that could make House mind his manners when he didn't want to. And he very seldom wanted to. House was House. There was no changing House. He was, generally speaking, worth it. On more than one level. Most of the time. He'd saved more lives than she could count, and that alone was justification for putting up with him.

After Ratchet was gone, House rubbed his hands together gleefully. "Oh, he's going to be _fun_."

"House ..."

"What?"

"Forget it." She decided she wasn't going to tell him _anything _about what Ratchet had told her. House could figure it out on his own, and she had a very strong suspicion that Ratchet would be a lot less forthcoming with House than he had been with her. It was petty and vindictive, but her embarrassment had been replaced by anger. Normally, she could tolerate quite a bit of House's crap, but suddenly, she just wasn't in the mood. "Just forget it."


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three

* * *

Optimus's holomatter avatar was wearing jeans, a red shirt, and worn, yet still sturdy, Redwing boots. He didn't look anything like the highest and most esteemed leader of his people. He looked, quite deliberately, more like a blue collar working man.

He stepped through the doorway, and then stopped short at the sight of Sam's still, broken form.

"Oh, Sam." Optimus sighed, obviously upset. He turned his gaze to Ratchet. "How is he?"

Ratchet shrugged, mouth twisting down into a frown. "The incompetent idiots here have managed not to kill him. The nanytes are hard at work. He could be off the vent now, but I don't see a problem with waiting a few hours in case he takes a turn for the worse. He was in a lot of pain when we woke him up, so we put him back under -- he's just out of it because he's sedated. He _was _lucky he wasn't killed outright. I had a look at the cross streets where he was found. There was blood on a wall two stories up, so I'm betting somebody batted him into a wall."

Optimus winced. Ratchet continued to scowl and asked, "Where are you parked?"

"At the Wal-mart down the road." Optimus would not fit into the hospital's parking garage, short of crawling into it on his hands and knees. Referring to the range of his avatar he said, "It's close enough."

"I won't ask you to pick anything up." Ratchet smirked. Optimus had to be pushing his limits and that meant he wouldn't have much ability to manipulate matter with the holoform. Frankly, Ratchet wasn't sure he could project his own avatar that far at all, but Optimus had a far bigger power plant, by virtue of being a bigger 'bot. "How are _you _doing?"

Optimus looked tired. He sighed, a human mannerism that was so expressive that they'd all picked it up. "I've tried to initiate contact with Megatron, and he's not answering personally. Starscream responded with some rude pictures of a man's naked posterior."

"Typical." Ratchet pressed his lips together, "Sam said they were after him, not Bee. They probably have some plot that needs the data in Sam's head. Wish we could figure out a way to get it _out _and erase it so they'd leave the kid alone."

"That doesn't mean they'd believe us. They might still go after him anyway." Optimus's expression was equally unhappy. Sam had saved Optimus's life -- twice -- and his world, twice. They _owed _him. More than that, they all liked him. Bee considered him a brother, and the feeling was definitely mutual. Sam had made it abundantly clear that he was going to law school with the express intent of helping the 'bots however they needed it once he graduated. He'd grown up a _lot _after Egypt, and no longer even tried to deny his bond with the Autobots. He was, at this point, one of the team, and part of their family.

"Hnnh." Ratchet sighed. "True."

"Mirage is down in the lobby, and Bluestreak and Prowl are on the parking garage roof. Dewey will be installed just up the hall within the hour." Optimus's words dropped to a murmur. "Sideswipe, Jolt, and Ironhide are patrolling the streets around the hospital. I'm monitoring a highway off ramp from the Wal-mart parking lot. Lennox and his crew are hanging out in civilian gear in the cafeteria. Nobody's getting to Sam."

_Not without one Pit of a fight, anyway, _Ratchet thought. He asked, curiously, "Mirage is in the lobby?"

"You'll know him when you see him." Optimus had the very faintest of smiles on his face. "So will any Pretenders, which is the general idea."

"Hm." Ratchet ran his hand over his face. "We can't hide this from the hospital staff, you know, and I do not want to."

"You'll anger Keller."

"So?" Ratchet folded his arms. "I've already told the hospital administrator -- Lisa Cuddy -- a bit. I want to tell her more. She needs to know, both because we're going to need to do decontamination and damage control, and because I'd like a few people in positions of responsibility to actually know who we are _anyway._"

"Do you think she can handle it?" Optimus's expression was grave.

Ratchet lifted his shoulder up in half a shrug. "I don't know. Only one way to find out. She's in a need-to-know position if things go south with the 'cons. I'd like to brief medical profession leaders on our tech, on what we can offer, and on what sorts of injuries she might see from 'con weapons. However, I'm not sure how much authority she really has. She doesn't seem to have much control over her staff."

Optimus frowned.

"The doctor in charge of Sam's care is a real aft." Ratchet pursed his lips for a second. "He's a clever man, supposedly a genius by human standards, but he has all the compassion of Shockwave. And zero moral integrity."

"That doesn't sound like a good combination for a physician."

"No." Ratchet reached his hand out and stroked Sam's unconscious arm. Optimus knew that Ratchet would _never _do such a thing if the boy was aware of it. He was, however, pointedly demonstrating the difference between _himself _and the other physician. Ratchet cared. Ratchet had a grumpy demeanor that sometimes flared into a hot temper; Optimus himself was quite wary of truly angering Ratchet. He could be impatient, judgmental, and was well known for throwing objects at the target of his rage. On more than one occasion, that target had been Optimus's own head.

However, he _cared_. Anyone who questioned his compassion would swiftly be a target of that famous temper.

Ratchet said, face still twisted into an expression of annoyance, "I don't think he sees people as anything more than interesting puzzles to solve. While I can see using someone like that in a lab, Cuddy has him interacting directly with patients, he's _head _of his department, and he's supposed to be training young doctors. And he is deliberately offensive, rude, crude, and antagonistic."

Optimus sighed. "You don't trust him."

"Not any farther than I could throw the Ark."

Optimus leaned against the wall. "And you don't trust them enough to leave Sam alone."

"No." Ratchet ran a hand over his face. "The nurses are overworked on a _normal _day. Primus forbid they ever have to deal with a disaster! There's about two patients to one staff member, and given what they do in this ward, which is for the most critical of patients, they almost need that ratio to be reversed. Some procedures need multiple people to do. That means that many patients are left alone if they don't have family to watch them. It only takes a second for a cognitively compromised patient to try to get up and fall, or pull a vital tube out, or assault another patient ... that's without even considering how unreliable some of this equipment is. It's _primitive _stuff. And there's not enough doctors to go around, and the hygiene is lacking, and ..."

"I'll watch him." Optimus said, hearing the worry in Ratchet's voice. "I'll comm you if anything about his condition changes. Don't worry. Go find Cuddy and see if you can figure her out. We could certainly use a few allies."

With a mutter about slagging _fragile _organics, Ratchet rose from the chair and headed for the door. He paused to add, "I'm sure we'll find Bee, Optimus."

Optimus couldn't bring himself to respond to that. Ratchet was voicing his hopes, but they had no proof, no reason to believe it would be true. He just nodded, and sat down in the chair that Ratchet had just vacated.

* * *

Cuddy was in her office when Dr. Ratchet stuck his head through the door and rapped his knuckles on the frame. "Got a moment?"

The warmth was back in his eyes, a little, though he still looked tense and irritated. She really did almost instinctively like him. Something about his sense of humor and his air of confidence, _and _the way he'd showed House up, made him quite attractive. It wasn't that she didn't like House -- if she was being honest with herself, House was all sorts of hot -- but rather, she hadn't met many people who weren't intimidated by him and who saw right through him.

"How's Sam?"

Apparently, asking him about his friend was the right thing to do, because Ratchet's expression lightened a little. He pushed the door shut behind him. "My boss is with him, and he is doing as well as can be expected. I'm going to suggest removing the vent this evening."

"Is he ready?"

Ratchet nodded. "I ... think you'll be surprised by how quickly he recovers. Even knowing it's alien technology at work, it is hard for many people to believe until they witness it."

"We could certainly use some of that alien tech in the real world." She propped her elbows on the desk and leaned forward, studying him. He'd stopped a few feet from her desk, and stood with his arms folded and his shoulders squared. He was a confident man, for certain, but _wary. _Cautious. It made him all the more appealing.

"Hmm." He studied her for a minute. "The aliens would like some of their tech released, and the nanytes could be adapted to a one-time use, in case of trauma, certainly. The trick will be to get the technology approved by the relevant human medical authorities."

"That could be a problem."

"A problem requiring human partners for the research studies, and to navigate human beaurocracy." The man smiled at her. "They will be looking for a hospital to partner with for real-world studies, you know."

Her eyes must have lit, because he chuckled, low but genuine. "I thought that the mention of research studies involving alien medical tech might get your interest. The general feeling from the aliens is that they would like to relieve suffering and extend human lifespans somewhat, but that the full benefit of their technology must wait. Humanity isn't ready for all of it now."

She snorted. "Probably not. -- So I've picked up from you that there are good aliens and bad aliens, right?"

That earned her a nod. "They're mechanoid entities -- living robots -- and the same species. Some good, some truly evil, and most falling on a spectrum in between. Just like people."

"Living robots."

Blue eyes regarded her keenly. She got the feeling he was assessing her reaction to that idea. She lifted an eyebrow and said, "Well, I'm not surprised that Earth's first contact with aliens would be alien _robots_. It'd be a lot easier to send a robot through space to another planet than something organic."

He smiled, briefly, but it was a real smile. "You are an intelligent woman."

She beamed, surprisingly flattered by the compliment.

Then he added, "There are organic species that travel through space, Cuddy. Faster than light travel is entirely possible. However, it was excellent speculation."

"So, living robots." She was repeating herself. Again. The whole subject seemed to have that effect on her. "What makes a robot _living_?"

"The nanytes in Sam's blood are part of their self-repair system, modified to work in a carbon based system rather than metal. Cybertronians are truly alive, and the nanytes are to Cybertronian life what cells are to carbon-based organisms. Mechs grow, heal, think, love, hate, worship a God and ... die." His eyes softened, saddened.

She said impulsively, "You like them."

_That _got her an unexpected reaction. He started laughing, rather hard, and when he finally got control of himself again, he said, "I'd slagging well _better _like them."

"It must be amazing to work with them." She'd liked seeing him laugh. He had a good laugh. It sure beat the scowl he'd had on his face when he had first entered. She just wasn't sure what had amused him so much. "Real aliens."

He shrugged. "Real aliens."

"How long have they been here?"

"There have been contacts with Earth, off and on, since before humans came down out of the trees. The good guys have been working with a few world leaders for about three years. They fought off the bad guys in Mission City ..."

She blinked. "That was supposed to have been a terrorist incident."

He growled, "Well, it _was_, it was just some seriously provoked Decepticons, not Al Qaeda. Not that Al Qaeda complained about getting the credit."

Ah, yes, she _definitely _liked his sense of humor. _Decepticons, _hmm? She wondered who'd made that name up for the bad guys.

"Dr. Ratchet," she said, speculatively, "I'd like to talk to you about this more ... over dinner, perhaps?"

His eyes widened, then he snorted. "I must apologize, Dr. Cuddy. I hope I have not misled you ... I am not angling for a date."

"Oh, damn." She snapped her finger, resolving to turn it into a joke. "_I _was."

"Hnnh. I am sorry, but you are not my type." He smiled faintly, laughter disappearing. "I have no romantic interest in you."

His reaction hurt, a little, but she couldn't resist teasing, "And just what _is _your type?"

His smiled. He was trying to let her down gently, damnit. He said, voice deliberately light, "Taller."

"Than me?" She wasn't short, and she wore heels, making her even taller.

"And you're a bit too girly, I'm afraid."

"Oh, _damn_." She started laughing, realizing she'd totally read him wrong. It had to be the uniform, throwing her gaydar off. Seriously. Nice young doctor, uber-compassionate, professional, smart, and very talented? With the balls to stand up to House? Of _course_ she wasn't his type. And he was heavily involved in the military, which meant complications for him. "Ah, don't ask, don't tell?"

"Something like that." There was an odd expression in his eyes, and she found she was second-guessing herself. Was her assumption wrong about his orientation? Was he just worried she'd say something to the wrong person? He seemed a bit evasive, because he suddenly wasn't making eye contact, and he'd tensed. But then he smiled again, "However, I would like to talk to you this evening."

"I know this great Chinese food place. We could do take-out." She assumed he wanted to talk about things best not discussed in public.

He hesitated, then nodded and said, firmly, "As long as you understand that this will be strictly professional."

She liked him more for that, she decided. He was hot, but he was not interested in anything beyond business, and she had to respect him for making that bluntly clear to her. Then she realized, _Ooh, but that mean's he's safe. He's going to be fun to tease. _

* * *

House was curious.

This was, of course, a dangerous thing. Even House would agree with that.

Aside from the sheer awesomeness of an alien infection (and it was technically an infection, if one assumed the nanytes were alive, and if they self-replicated that was good enough in his book) there was Dr. Robert Ratchet.

Dr. Robert Ratchet was not listed anywhere. Cuddy seemed willing to accept 'I'm working under a pseudonym' because the CDC and the U.S. _President _were vouching for him. However, House was madly curious about who precisely he was. How did one get to be the go-to guy for alien infections?

And on top of that, what had actually happened to Sam? Somebody had tried to kill him, and had very nearly succeeded. Ratchet had quizzed Sam about enemies with odd code names -- were they aliens? Something else? Cuddy probably knew more, but she wasn't telling House. He'd asked her to spill and she'd bluntly refused.

_Be nice, _she'd said, _and maybe I'll tell you later. _And then she'd smiled teasingly at him and walked away.

And now Cuddy was making googly eyes at Ratchet. Which was all sorts of wrong. On many levels. He'd just watched Cuddy and Ratchet walk by, and the look in Cuddy's eyes was unmistakable. She'd turned that look of hormonal attraction House's way often enough, then refused to act on it, possibly because she had more self respect and possibly because she got more out of saying 'no' to him than she got out of saying 'yes'. The mind games were awesome, and half the reason he was so attracted to Cuddy was that Cuddy played them right back at him.

House was curious about Dr. Ratchet and _jealous_, though he would have denied the latter. He also thought Cuddy's attraction to the man was funny, because Ratchet wasn't in the slightest bit interested back. His body language was aloof. He hadn't looked at Cuddy's boobs _once. _Really, the guy was probably gay. House hadn't met too many straight men who _wouldn't _check Cuddy out, repeatedly, and with approval, because, dude, she was _Lisa Cuddy. _

Gay. Definitely.

_Bet he gets all sorts of hot gay sexing love when he wears that uniform, _House thought, maliciously. No, he didn't like Dr. Ratchet _at all. _But he did represent a mystery, a huge one.

What, precisely, were the nanytes? Who had created them? Were they as harmless, even as beneficial, as Ratchet claimed? Who were the aliens? What did they look like? Where were they?

Could he get his hands on that scanner?

_He put it in his vehicle, _House recalled. Well, he had a slim jim in his office, along with quite a few other tools used for entering vehicles and homes without _breaking _anything.

"I'll meet you at your house later, after I check on Sam," Ratchet said, to Cuddy, just loud enough for House to hear. They were at the end of the hall. He was pretending to be interested in a Mt. Dew machine, a hundred feet away. The machine was new -- he was pretty sure there had been a snack machine here until recently.

_Ooooh, she's moving fast._

"I'm looking forward to it," Cuddy said, flirtatiously, to Ratchet.

Ratchet snorted, and said, with some evident amusement, "Your associates will think we're going to be doing questionable activities if you talk to me in that tone."

Cuddy shot House a look, catching his gaze in her direction. With a smirk, she said, "That _is _the general idea."

"Ah." Ratchet reached for the door at the end of the hall, held it open, and ushered Cuddy through with a gentlemanly gesture of one hand. His parting words, as the door shut, were certainly for House's benefit. "Does House behave better when he thinks he has a chance with you?"

Cuddy's laughter, muffled by the door, made House pissed. Her reaction hurt, though he'd never let her see it.

Well, he was _going _to get his hands on Ratchet's precious scanner, and see what else he could find in that ridiculous looking neon yellow ambulance that Ratchet had arrived in. (He had followed Ratchet out to the parking garage earlier to find out what his ride looked like.)

He didn't trust Ratchet. He didn't like Ratchet. It had _nothing _to do with Cuddy's (probably unrequited) interest in the man. It had everything to do with aliens, and mysteries, and Ratchet standing in the way of some real answers. Ratchet certainly wouldn't tell House any of his secrets, so House figured a bit of snooping was completely appropriate.

_We might have a real threat to public health here. And I'll be the one to spill the beans._

Oh, yes. He wasn't going to let some two-bit army whiskey stand in the way of some real answers.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

* * *

House approached the ambulance cautiously, well aware that Ratchet could be following close behind. Still, given the other doctor's insufferably compassionate nature, he was probably going to hang out in Sam's room for hours and make with the warm-fuzzies.

The ambulance was lime green.

He blinked at it.

He could have _sworn _it was neon yellow, earlier.

Well, maybe his mind was playing tricks on him. It was in the same spot.

After a quick glance over his shoulder, he slid the slim piece of metal in between the window and the door, on the driver's side. He was quite pleased when he managed to catch the latch on only the third try and pop it. He reached for the door handle.

With a distinct _thunk _the door locked again.

_Security system? _House wondered, when this happened a second and third time.

Muttering, he limped around to the passenger side of the door, and tried again. This time, the he managed to unlock it, open it, and then ... the door pulled free of his hand with surprising force and slammed shut.

He jumped. And stared. "That was different."

Well, maybe he'd have better luck with the rear doors. He started to climb up onto the bumper to reach them, and the ambullance _whooped _at him with the loudest car-alarm sound he'd ever heard. Startled, he fell backwards and landed on his butt on the concrete. And then, to his surprise, the ambulance rolled backwards towards him.

He scrambled frantically out of the vehicle's way. It stopped after a couple of feet, just enough to have scared him.

"Idiot forgot to set his parking brake," House mumbled. Then, brighter, he said, "That means _I _have to set it or this could be a hazard!"

Grinning at an excuse to cause some damage, he dug a wrench out of his pocket. He hadn't foreseen needing to break a window, oh no, he'd just brought the wrench along on a whim ... House walked around to the driver's window and whacked it, hard.

Instead of the glass breaking, the wrench simply bounced off it, and vibrated like a tuning fork. House shook his stinging fingers and glared at the vehicle. The vehicle's radio promptly clicked on, and started playing Lisa Marie Presley's 'Idiot'.

"Remote control," House realized, with some anger. "Okay, Ratchet, where are you?"

The ambulance flung the driver's side door open, hitting him just hard enough to knock him on his butt again. House said a rude word, picked himself up, and whacked the vehicle back with the wrench. He was annoyed to see his blow didn't even leave a scratch.

Something clicked and hummed inside the ambulance. It sounded ominously threatening. There were a few _chock chock chock _noises, and a metallic scrape. The vehicle shifted in place, making him take a step backwards. Then it seemed to settle back down on its shocks and a voice with metallic reverb, but sounding a good bit like Dr. Ratchet, growled, "You are just not worth it. Try anything more and I'll just call the police ... oh, slag, Dr. House, you need to get out of here _now_!"

The voice had gone from annoyed to alarmed in one breath.

"Why?" he demanded.

"Slag, no time ... get _in_." The rear door popped open.

House was pretty sure it was a trap. House was also pretty sure that Dr. Ratchet sounded genuinely worried. Instincts for self preservation warred with instincts for self preservation. His curiosity took a vote, and propelled him up into the back of the vehicle. The door slammed. The windows tinted dark. And everything went very quiet.

"What is it?"

"Unidentified alien, in the parking garage, coming this way." Ratchet's voice was very low now. "Be _quiet_. Do not move. I'm powering down everything I can and hoping he won't notice me until backup arrives. I'd really rather not go mano-a-mano with a 'con when there's civilians around, I don't know who it is, and my backup is three floors above me and stuck behind an old lady who can't figure out how to park her Buick."

"Aliens," House said. "_You _fight them?"

"Shut up."

"Why would aliens be interested in me?"

"House," Ratchet said, "you could piss off Primus himself and they have zero patience with squishies. Shut up."

"What do they look like?" He tried to see out the glass.

"Shut up and _be still._" A pause. "If I tell you to run, _run_. Head for the stairwell. I'll be a sufficient distraction that they probably won't bother with you."

He didn't like that _probably. _"If you haven't noticed, track and field is not my best sport."

"I'm sure you'll manage. Shut the slag up before I gas you."

"Wouldn't be able to run if I was gassed, now would I?"

Something _hissed _within the cabin of the ambulance.

"Okay, okay!" He shut up. After a second, the hissing stopped.

Then he heard it: A distinctive ka-thump, ka-thump, ka-thump, ka-thump noise. He wasn't sure what it was. The air inside the ambulance grew electric with tension. Surely, he didn't imagine that the vehicle itself seemed to be holding its breath ...

* * *

Lisa Cuddy frowned at the fiften foot high copper sculpture of a robot in the main lobby. She didn't remember hearing anything about an art exhibit. The robot was sleek, elegant, with chiseled humanoid features and a slender build. It stood tall, proud, and was quite a beautiful thing ... if one liked pop culture sci-fi art.

Clearly, some of the patients and their families did. She walked past a little boy in a wheelchair and his mother, both admiring the statue. She was halfway between the statue of the robot and the door when she heard a _chock chock chock _noise behind her, and the little boy said, "Cool!" and his mother screamed.

She half turned. Then darted out of the way.

The statue of a robot, eyes glowing blue, launched himself forward. With astounding speed and grace, in a spectacular display of mechanical engineering, the robot transformed into a small copper-colored sports car. The automatic doors opened. She didn't think he'd fit through them, but somehow he did with scant fractions of an inch to spare on either side of his tires.

And then he peeled out, spun his tires, and ... disappeared.

"That was ..." Cuddy stared after him. "That was probably an alien."

* * *

Ratchet paced restlessly. "How far are you away now?"

"A quarter mile. Mirage is on his way." Optimus bared his teeth in something that might have been a grin, but was too threatening for that. "Cuddy got an up-close look at him, by the way."

"Lovely. And here _I _wanted to be the one to scare her witless the first time." He paused. "I'm betting she didn't scare much."

Ratchet, in the garage, monitored Dr. House's vitals with an absent scanner. The annoying doctor's pulse was rapid, his breathing sharp, and the air was rich with cortisol, humanity's stress hormone.

He could hear the 'con coming, a steady cha-chunk cha-chunk cha-chunk noise. He was operating under the assumption that it was a Decepticon until proven otherwise. An Autobot should have responded to his terse comm'd demands to identify itself by now.

And how the _slag _had it gotten past their perimeter?

Optimus, over the comm, said, _:Ironhide's about ready to ram that old lady in the Buick who's blocking their way. Do you have a visual on your 'con ...?:_

:No.: He waited a second, because it was very close now. Then, to his astonishment, his delight, and his everlasting relief, the yellow nose of a familiar Camaro rolled around the corner. _:Primus, it's Bee.:_

:Why didn't he answer our hails?:

:Because he's beat to slag and back. And I couldn't scan him through all the concrete in this structure.: Ratchet sagged on his shocks in relief that Bee was alive and free. Bee was moving slowly, and the thumping noise was a shredded tire. His entire side was caved in. The glass was broken out of all of his windows, which said something about the fight he'd been in -- Cybertronian glass was stern stuff.

Bee, who had almost certainly been homing in on Ratchet's comm signals, pulled into the empty parking space beside him, transformed with a desperate groan ... and stopped. His engine quit, his electrical system powered down, the lights in his eyes died. Without a word, he let himself go limp and slipped into stasis lock. Energon and coolant dripping from damaged lines was the only sound he made.

"Get out." Ratchet needed to see to Bee _right now_. He was scanning Bee even as he spoke, and it was immediately clear that the young Autobot was critical. Bee's decision to transform before before powering down, despite his exposed position in the middle of a public parking garage, _might _allow Ratchet to save his life. At least he could reach Bee's vitals easier.

"You want me to run?" House was frightened. Clearly, he'd heard Bee transform right next to them and was drawing some nervous conclusions.

"There's no threat to you. It was a friend, not an enemy. However, you may run now, if you wish." Ratchet popped his back doors open. "Get _out_."

House scrambled down, saw Bee, and stopped short. "Well, that's certainly different."

Ratchet ignored him, assuming that the human doctor would scram when he started to transform. House did retreat, with a startled oath, when the ambulance unfolded himself into a giant robot who was so large that he couldn't stand upright in the tight confines of the garage.

"Ah ... hello." House stared up at him. "When Dr. Ratchet said the aliens were robots, he didn't say they were _fucking giant alien robots _that turn into _vehicles_, but that's ... kinda cool, actually."

"Get lost. I'm busy." Ratchet produced a tool kit from subspace, and crouched on his hands and knees over Bee. Bee was not leaking energon at a frightening rate only because he'd lost a frightening amount of energon already. He needed an emergency transfusion, immediately. Ratchet checked his own energon levels, determined that they were reasonably high, and that he could spare several gallons without impairing his performance. Bee was going to need a lot more than that, though.

_:Optimus, I'm going to need energon donors here. Bee's scrapped.:_

:On my way.:

:There's no way you'll fit in here safely. If we get attacked, you'll be pinned down. At least us short 'bots can scramble about on our hands and knees. You'd have to belly crawl.:

:I've got more energon to spare than all of the rest of you combined.: Optimus pointed out.  
_  
:And I'll send someone down to get it from you.:_

_:That will mean completely breaking our cover.: _Optimus fretted.  
_  
:And?: _Ratchet challenged him. _:I'm not letting Bee die because the human government's made up of a bunch of weenies who don't have the bearings to tell their own people aliens are real.: _

Optimus, perhaps wisely, didn't argue with the CMO on this. Optimus was their leader. Ratchet respected him immensely. Ratchet valued saving Bee's life just a little bit more than any oath he'd taken to follow Optimus, however, and Optimus fragging well knew it.

Meanwhile, House had not run away. Indeed, he was staring at Ratchet open fascination as Ratchet flared the armor open on his own arm. Ratchet decided to ignore him unless House got in his way.

Ratchet, with a hiss of pain, sank a giant-sized transfusion needle into the largest fuel line in his own arm that he could readily reach. Working swiftly, well aware that Bee was nearly dead and only the scout's pluck and blasted stubbornness had gotten him this far, he taped the needle down with a wad of duct tape, then manually cracked open Bee's chest with desperate, clawing fingers. Bee's spark shone brilliant. He'd fix Bee's hinges _later_.

"What's that? Is it radioactive?"

"His spark -- you would say, his soul. And yes." Ratchet didn't bother to clarify that 'radioactive' meant 'UV radiation' -- which _could _be harmful to humans, though not without massive amounts of exposure. "Get back."

House scrambled backwards, muttering something about 'cherenkov radiation' that made Ratchet smirk despite the situation when he devoted a tiny portion of his processor to looking that term up. Ratchet sighed, and honesty compelled him to explain, "UV. It'll just give you a sunburn if you stand in front of it for an hour."

"Oh." House drew closer, fascinated, as Ratchet found a primary energon line, jammed a needle as thick around as a human finger directly into it, taped the needle in place, attached tubing between the one in his forearm and the one in Bee's chest, flicked a valve on the transfusion line open, and started the flow of fuel.

"You're giving him a transfusion," House recognized. "Uh. Right?"

Ratchet snapped, "I don't have time to answer dumb questions."

"What about good ones?" House shot back. "Like, do you need some help?"

Ratchet very nearly told him to scram. However, the guy was of above average intelligence, and either too brave or too stubborn to run screaming in terror from him. Ratchet, after only a half second's consideration, unsubspaced two gallon-sized energon containers and two giant-size IV sets. He thrust the materials at House with one impatient hand. House only flinched away a little before reaching up to take them. "There's another giant alien robot outside. He's too big to fit in the garage. He's got _lots _of energon in his lines. That's our blood. You think you can figure out how to fill those containers up?"

House snapped back, "Put a needle in a vein, draw a bunch of blood. I _think _that is within the scope of my medical training."

"Good." Ratchet upped his own fuel pressure to speed the energon flow to Bee's nearly empty lines. Simultaneously, he started prying off crumpled armor to get at the damage underneath.

"Will he squish me?"

"No."

"Good." House hurried off towards the elevator, cane ticking on concrete.

A very slow moving Buick rolled past, the driver apparently oblivious to the two giant alien robots, one near death and the other crouched under what was (to the robot) a very low ceiling. Ironhide, Prowl, and Bluestreak were all on her tail, and transformed as soon as they reached Ratchet's position.

_:Was that wise?: _Ironhide said, having overheard the discussion. _:You said the man can't be trusted.:_

:It gets him out of my way. Get your aft over here, old soldier. I need your energon.: Ratchet grabbed him by the arm, and roughly jammed his fingers under a plate of armor on Ironhide's forearm when Ironhide was slow to lift it out of the way. Prowl, simultaneously, started a line on Bluestreak. They all knew the basics of battlefield medicine, and energon was critical to life.

_And I refuse to let Bee die. I've lost too many friends, and I'm not losing this one. _Ratchet started patching leaks, even as Prowl began hooking the other two mechs up to Bee's system. His world narrowed in focus to the immediate task of saving a life. Everything else was inconsequential.


End file.
